Where Is Joey Today?

A Smashing Fourth!

Trisha and I arrived exhausted. The six hour flight is just not enough to get any sleep on (not that I do much sleeping on flights). Between dinner and and breakfast, your window for actually doing sleeping is about 4 hours.

Our plans for an easy transition from Heathrow to Dollis Hill via a Jubillee line change at Green Park was tharwted by planned maintenance on both lines. A few rail replacement bus changes later we arrived at the hostel/bar out in Zone 3. The doors were locked since the pub didn't open until 10am.

We finally got into our room about 30 minutes after arriving and took a collapsing sleep for about 3 hours. After the nap we were informed we had to change rooms since there was a double booking. The place was not run well, pretty dirty, and loud. I don't really recommend it to anyone.

After a little debate as to what to do we settled on giving Brick Lane a visit for some Vindaloo.

Haggling on Brick Lane gets you deals but doesn't always curry flavor with the owner...

Brick Lane (just off the Aldgate East) is an amazing place to have dinner. One curry house after another. What once was a novelty restaurant row in a South Asian neighborhood is now as London as Fish and Chips and a pint of Fullers.

We passed by a number of closed shops (apparently they typically close between lunch and dinner). As we passed by Saffron the guy comes out and says, 20% off and we'll buy the first drink.

Trisha beamed and excitedly said that it looked like a good deal. Good luck haggling there. I countered (rather modestly I might add) that I wanted a pint of beer not a half pint. He came back with a pint and 10% off. I told him there was no difference so when Trisha said she would take wine he agreed to our deal.

Dinner was delicious and extremely hot, just as it was last year. Our total damage was about 20 quid. Not too shabby.

We strolled through East London to Liverpool St and then headed off to St Paul's where we spent an hour sketching the scenery, enjoying a cup of coffee and people watching. The 80s were in full swing that night for one girl's birthday. Her friends came up to us to offer what Trisha called the worst birthday cake ever. Pink mayo flavored icing.

She was feeling a bit sick so we headed back to the hostel where the club music thumping from below made it difficult to sleep.

I need to catch a bus, I'll pick it up later. And post photos.

--Joey